Transformations Come in All Sizes

We love helping our clients transform their homes in whatever way works for them. We’ve helped small houses become mid-sized, and mid-sized homes expand to large and spacious.  In this edition, we tell the story of designing changes that brought a home from tiny to small.

We want to point out that even though the result is still a “small” house, the transformation for the family was gigantic. One addition literally helped this house grow with its family. It’s a story we love to tell.

This 764 square-foot home was a small cape cod style house in a lake community. It was barely big enough for the couple who lived there. Besides the master bedroom, there was a very small second bedroom which was really only large enough to use as a home office.

Up a very narrow and steep staircase, you could reach a finished attic which they used as a guest bedroom, and for storage when no one was staying over. Not surprisingly, this tiny house only had one very small bathroom. The homeowners were at a stage in their life where they were eager to start a family, so in preparation for the hoped-for “human addition”, they asked us to design an addition to their home.

While selling and buying is always a consideration, the homeowners didn’t want to move away, as they loved their lake community, social circle and close friends. 

While in the planning stages of this project, we received the best news ever: the couple became pregnant! So as the house was growing, so was the family.

For this project, we removed the finished attic and roof to build a full 2nd story. On the second floor, we gave the couple a new master bedroom, with a spacious walk-in closet that exceeded their hopes.

We added a full-size bathroom, to be shared with the master bedroom and a new second bedroom, which was now happily assigned to the baby.

Lastly, there is a new small loft area that could be used as a home office space. It’s an open area at the top of the stairs, to the side.

Downstairs, there were minimal physical changes, other than to re-assign the rooms. Their former master bedroom became a full-sized guest bedroom for out-of-town parents. The downstairs bathroom remained untouched.

The unique challenge is that it’s still a little house (it “grew” from 764 to 1332 square feet), so our design goals were to maximize this limited space.

Even though the square footage was small, the project timeline was still similar to that of a typical project because no matter the size of the project, we still go through the same process and same steps. Measuring & documenting the existing house, helping the owners with making decisions, our design work & revisions, etc. And then during construction there are still all of the tradesmen and the same requirements for inspections.

However, there was one that thing that helped in keeping the timeline shorter. It was that there was no requests to change the kitchen: this always extends the project timeline.

Even though the addition was relatively small, it greatly transformed the house and gave them enough space for their growing family. It allowed them to stay in the community that they loved.

Many of our clients are owners of homes in a lake community. Rightfully, they love their neighborhood and wouldn’t dream of selling. Lake communities are typically tight-knit, with lots of social activities. When their current homes can no longer support their lifestyle, rather than leave, the homeowners call us to request a renovation project rather than move.

We get it and want to see their dreams come to reality. If you know of anyone in a lake community who wants to go from “liking” to “LOVING” their home, we’d love to help them!

Do you have transformational dreams for your house and
simply can’t “see it happening?”
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